Country singer Lorrie Morgan was just two years old when Patsy Cline released her hit song “I Fall to Pieces” in 1961. The song, written by Hank Cochran and Harlan Howard, was a real tearjerker. That was because it wasn’t just a simple breakup song that everyone was accustomed to listening to.
It was about a despairing story of a woman trying in vain to hold herself together after getting her heart broken. She attempted to move on with her life with someone new, but forgetting her lost love proved to be difficult. Add to that narrative the restrained honky-tonk beat and Patsy Cline’s emotive vocals, and you have the three ingredients that’d guarantee a flowing river of tears.
And it wasn’t an easy feat to deliver that level of emotion.
But when Morgan performed it many years later on, she did so with so much ease. She understood every hit of feelings in the song, effectively conveying them. And it was as piercing as Cline sounded when she sang it because she stuck to the original piece as close as she could. She didn’t change it up too much for the sake of injecting her personality, earning the respect of the song’s fans.
For You
Morgan went on to be a successful country singer, topping the charts and becoming the youngest inductee of the Grand Ole Opry in 1984. And then, in 2013, she once again had the chance to cover another song by Patsy Cline. That is, she top-billed a tribute concert for the singer along with Pam Tillis, wherein she sang Cline’s “Leavin’ on Your Mind.” It was staged together with the Country Music Hall of Fame’s exhibit, “Patsy Cline: Crazy for Loving You.”
Watch Lorrie Morgan’s rendition of “I Fall to Pieces” in the video below. And if you have the time, do check out the rest of Lorrie Morgan’s songs!
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